The Official Sega Saturn Thread!

[cybercylon]

I have wondered if even some enhanced port of Sonic CD would have help at launch (better colors, more features, etc). It might have helped Sonic CD reach a wider audience.

 

I think the Saturn would have still struggled in NA regardless, but that (any kind of Sonic game) may have been one step to help it last longer.

[+jgkspsx]

I think the lack of Sonic games (and the painful Knuckles Chaotix and the fun but very different Sonic R) did in the 32X and Saturn both. The Sega CD had a lot of lazy ports and not-exactly-prime FMV in its library but Sonic CD alone was worth owning the system for. Virtua Fighter and Virtua Racing and Daytona and Panzer Dragoon just weren’t system sellers the way a Mario 64 was.

 

Nothing looked quite as good or was as easy to pick up and play as Ridge Racer and Tekken and Warhawk. There was nothing prominent that checked the boxes of mid 90s rad like Twisted Metal and ESPN Extreme.

 

Plus people (not just players but retailers) were mad at Sega for selling them the Sega CD and 32X (or trying to) and were excited about a brand new system with a huge marketing push from the most popular company in home electronics.

 

Sega was weakened by its missteps and could not pull off what they needed to do, which was always going to be a really heavy lift. The way they killed the Saturn, cleanly and finally, really sucked for Saturn owners but gave the Dreamcast a real shot to be a comeback. If the Genesis had been replaced by the Saturn directly, even slightly earlier, things might have turned out differently. But hindsight is 20-20.

[Steven Pendleton]

30 minutes ago, cybercylon said:

I have wondered if even some enhanced port of Sonic CD would have help at launch (better colors, more features, etc). It might have helped Sonic CD reach a wider audience.

 

I think the Saturn would have still struggled in NA regardless, but that (any kind of Sonic game) may have been one step to help it last longer.

I was thinking the same thing not long after my last post, actually...

 

There is one thing to consider, though, which is timing of the release. I don't remember exactly when the 2D = bad thing started in the US, but it wouldn't have been too long after the releases of the PS1 and/or Saturn. There's a decent chance that a 2D Sonic game might have hurt the system if it released at the wrong time. As an early release, I think it probably would have been fine. After maybe 1996, I don't think it would have done much. Still, Konami got away with Dracula X on the PS1 somehow, so it wouldn't have been entirely impossible. I don't think that game sold crazy huge numbers, but it did well enough, I think.

 

9 minutes ago, jgkspsx said:

I think the lack of Sonic games (and the painful Knuckles Chaotix and the fun but very different Sonic R) did in the 32X and Saturn both. The Sega CD had a lot of lazy ports and not-exactly-prime FMV in its library but Sonic CD alone was worth owning the system for. Virtua Fighter and Virtua Racing and Daytona and Panzer Dragoon just weren’t system sellers the way a Mario 64 was.

 

Nothing looked quite as good or was as easy to pick up and play as Ridge Racer and Tekken and Warhawk. There was nothing prominent that checked the boxes of mid 90s rad like Twisted Metal and ESPN Extreme.

 

Plus people (not just players but retailers) were mad at Sega for selling them the Sega CD and 32X (or trying to) and were excited about a brand new system with a huge marketing push from the most popular company in home electronics.

 

Sega was weakened by its missteps and could not pull off what they needed to do, which was always going to be a really heavy lift. The way they killed the Saturn, cleanly and finally, really sucked for Saturn owners but gave the Dreamcast a real shot to be a comeback. If the Genesis had been replaced by the Saturn directly, even slightly earlier, things might have turned out differently. But hindsight is 20-20.

Yeah, Chaotix is... not so great. I always forget that it exists, and there's a reason I've never played it past the first 5 or 10 minutes or so. Sega made a lot of mistakes with the Saturn. Lack of Sonic was one of them, but it was that combined with a bunch of other mistakes that killed the Saturn outside Japan. Even here, the Saturn wasn't anywhere close to being as successful as the PS1, but it still did okay.

Edited February 20, 2021 by Steven Pendleton

[Zap1982]

It's interesting trying to speculate how an exclusive 2D Sonic game might have been received but 3D was the all new thing back then and whilst 2D Sonic rocks, back in the Saturn days it wouldn't have been able to compete with Nintendos Mario 64 and Crash Bandicoot on the PSX.

 

You are probably already familiar with the development hell that Sonic X-Treme went through rendering its "cancellation" so I won't go into it but whilst a 3D Sonic would have helped the Saturn it wouldn't have ever enabled it to be a formidable opponent to Sony and Nintendo.

 

The damage with consu ers, retailers and developers was already done.

Edited February 20, 2021 by Zap1982

[+jgkspsx]

I was one of the “lucky” ones who had the Tower of Power. I wanted a Saturn, but the fact that the 32X versions of Virtua Fighter and Virtua Racing were superior to the Saturn versions and the fact that the Saturn didn’t have any free flight 3D space shooters like Shadow Squadron when I rented it from Blockbuster definitely lessened it in my eyes. I wouldn’t have been able to wheedle it for a Christmas or birthday present for at least a year after I got the 32X anyway, and by then all my friends had Playstations and the war was over.

[youxia]

Not sure Sonic would've helped much. Nintendo had killer apps in form of Mario and Zelda, both amazing, beloved franchises in 3D, and yet it also got steamrolled by Sony. Yes, both Sega and Nintendo made some big hardware mistakes, but I think it was maybe also down to a sort of cultural shift and a change of guard. Sony was a fresh, upstart challenger breaking into a duopoly and somewhat epitomised the Nineties zeitgeist, what with hip franchises such as Wipeout, Tony Hawk, Resident Evil, Driver and such like (that apart from all the other more traditional hits such as FF or some superb arcade ports). It was a far cry from fam-friendly Sonic and Mario and has captured the market perfectly.

[Hydro Thunder]

13 hours ago, jgkspsx said:

I was one of the “lucky” ones who had the Tower of Power. I wanted a Saturn, but the fact that the 32X versions of Virtua Fighter and Virtua Racing were superior to the Saturn versions and the fact that the Saturn didn’t have any free flight 3D space shooters like Shadow Squadron when I rented it from Blockbuster definitely lessened it in my eyes. I wouldn’t have been able to wheedle it for a Christmas or birthday present for at least a year after I got the 32X anyway, and by then all my friends had Playstations and the war was over.

I completely understand the emotion you're expressing, but am honestly pretty baffled by saying the 32X Virtua Fighter was superior to the Saturn VF.  I know the Saturn VF wasn't up to arcade quality, but I still love it and think it's SO smooth.  I like the 32X VF don't get me wrong, but putting them both side by side makes the 32X version look just awful, the Saturn's version is so much better animated and the polygons so much better shaded and drawn.  And same for looks for the Virtua Racing comment (though I agree Virtua Racing Deluxe is better in terms of options and gameplay, so moot point to an extent).  

 

And got to agree with you, Shadow Squadron is a deeply underrated title, one of the most beautiful examples of what non-textured polygons can do in the right hands.

[+jgkspsx]

The 32X version looks more normal. The Saturn version looks like everyone’s been on starvation rations for years. The Saturn version is smooth but I spent so much time with the 32X version that I suppose my idea of it is skewed.

[IntelliMission]

I never touched a Saturn back in the day as none of my friends had it (the closer I was to the Saturn was one guy who said he won one in a Sega Rally contest).

 

However, as someone who considers the original Playstation my favorite console, I'm starting to appreciate the console because it's definitely the most similar one to Sony's first console.

 

They were released at the same time and had very similar graphics, and even similar games many times (with Namco and Sega doing the arcade ports).

 

Sony killed the Saturn by offering a similar "mature" and pixelated approach, but with:

 

- A cool name and a cool looking controller (Saturn's name and logo are terrible and the controller looks too similar to previous Sega controllers).

 

- Much better "non arcade" games (Panzer Dragoon games are great, but Sonic R, Burning Rangers, Nights and others feel like failed experiments).

 

- Konami, Namco, Electronic Arts, Square... I'm not sure exactly what happened, but Sega somehow did not a good job securing games from many major developers.

 

- A console that was much more easy to program (even if some Saturn games look pretty cool when the 2nd processor is used well).

 

- A clear focus on 3D games Vs. the 2D approach that seemed to prevail in the Saturn.

 

- Sega couldn't win the price war against an entertainment industry giant.

 

Looking back, I feel kind of bad for Sega. In a way, Sony won thanks to a few things that I don't really appreciate (I hate turn-based RPGs, Sony clearly used their ability to throw more money to gain exclusiveness with companies, Electronic Arts sports games sucked in the 90s or at least the soccer ones did...).

 

It's crazy when you think about the first games for the original Playstation, that were not very interesting. I wonder if Sega thought that Sony's first console was going to be another 3DO.

Edited February 21, 2021 by IntelliMission

[Zap1982]

3 hours ago, jgkspsx said:

The 32X version looks more normal. The Saturn version looks like everyone’s been on starvation rations for years. The Saturn version is smooth but I spent so much time with the 32X version that I suppose my idea of it is skewed.

I have never played the Saturn Virtua Racing Deluxe but from having the two systems myself I can certainly say that the smoothness in gameplay for Doom & Virtua Fighter are noticeably superior in the 32X port to the Saturn if you play them side by side.

 

The Saturn is obviously the superior system but developers seem to have had many documented problems getting their games to run properly. I guess the insustry when you think about it may have been a bit inexperienced with the shift from 2D to 3D, it's something we haven't really seen a comparible shift in since. That and dare I say (is pride the right word?)  The slavedriver engine was built from scratch for the Saturn to run the likes of Exhumed and Quake because their native engines would struggle.

 

I am just thinking again of Doom, a Saturn specfic engine was made built from scratch but John Carmack at id insited that the version we know today (the butchered Playstation version) was to be used which in fair play to Carmack years later when asked admits was a mistake and that the Saturn was more than capable if he had allowed more experimentation. Apparently the Saturn version is only really running on half capacity because a lot of stuff the PSX version did that was through it's hardware the Saturn is forced to do through Software leading to a massive load of bloat on one processor.

[Hydro Thunder]

Well, I will let anyone that wishes to decide for themselves after playing both or watching videos of both VFs on Saturn and 32X.  I don't wish to rip the 32X, but I think the Saturn version really beats it handily.  Obviously, to each his/her own.

 

Different note entirely...

My internal memory had been dead for awhile on my Saturn.  I had forgotten that when the 2032 battery dies so does your internal memory.  So I swapped it out, and life is much better now as a Saturn owner (not having to forward through the date / time entry and language every time at the very least!).  Plus I hadn't remembered that my ancient (from like seriously 1996) Action Replay Plus has backup memory too, so I need to be regularly copying to that.  Getting a different Action reply off Ebay from China with Pseudo Kai on it, hoping it arrives soon as a couple of backups don't play on my modded console and need Pseudo Kai.

Was glad to see that a few places on Ebay and elsewhere do the FRAM mod (replaces the need for a battery basically permanently) relatively cheaply ($50ish, give or take shipping etc).

 

And finally hooked up my old GXTV so that I could play some Virtua Cop.  Not optimal on the tin 13" screen, but still fun.  Considering getting a Trintron 20" from a local, but he wants $200 for it.  And given that the almost sole reason I would get it would be for Virtua Cop 1 & 2 and HOTD...seems a bridge too far.  Very very sad missing my 27" Flat Trinitron that died after being dropped in a move.  *pours one out for it*

[Zap1982]

14 hours ago, Curious Sofa said:

I had forgotten that when the 2032 battery dies so does your internal memory. 

When replacing the battery its worth spending on a decent one - I learnt that the hard way.. a cheapo battery will last weeks, maybe even a month and then bye bye saves. A decent battery should last possibly years if played regularly.

 

Memory card is handy as you don't have to worry about the internal clock then.

 

Want to try the Pseudo Saturn one day. I'd like a second saturn though just because mine has a few ....... "quirks"

[+-^CrossBow^-]

I've got one of the original Action Replay 4 in 1+ units from the late 90s that has the parallel port on the top of it. But I pretty much only use it for backing up the game saves from the Saturn. Although I did install the FRAM mod into both of my Saturns about a year ago I think now? I have a Phantom chip in my spare and a Rhea in my main one so I'm essentially covered for my Saturn gaming.

 

[+Cafeman]

If you haven't already watched this excellent documentary on the development of Saturn Virtua Racing, check it out.  I've bookmarked the time index for when one of the developers explains how difficult it was to test this game because SEGA hadn't provided a dev kit yet, or decent debugger for the twin CPU's.  So they just used 1 CPU  - which helps to explain why just about every 3rd party did likewise for a while.  

 

 

 

[Hydro Thunder]

8 hours ago, Cafeman said:

If you haven't already watched this excellent documentary on the development of Saturn Virtua Racing, check it out.  I've bookmarked the time index for when one of the developers explains how difficult it was to test this game because SEGA hadn't provided a dev kit yet, or decent debugger for the twin CPU's.  So they just used 1 CPU  - which helps to explain why just about every 3rd party did likewise for a while.  

 

 

 

Thank you for this, @Cafeman!!  Amazing review / documentary.  I have never owned the Virtua Racing for Saturn, but wanted it.  Friend got it for me off ebay a long time ago...and the case was VR but the game was VF2   Now I got to get it.  What an amazing story, they sure made the most of their options, with that crazy debugging business.  Really gives you a window into what a mess Sega was.  As a lifelong huge Segaholic, this was painful too.

Going to have to watch more of this guy's videos; his rankings looked pretty similar to mine at a glance.  

[Steven Pendleton]

On 3/1/2021 at 2:04 PM, Curious Sofa said:

I had forgotten that when the 2032 battery dies so does your internal memory. 

Yeah, when I got my Saturn last year (maybe less than an hour before I started this thread), the seller had replaced the battery. It's been fine so far, but I wonder how long it will last. I have the 4MB RAM cart in there now since I greatly underestimated how much of the system's storage my games would take and it's basically full now. I need to get a memory cartridge or an Action Replay to keep my saves, just in case.

[NinjaWarrior]

10 hours ago, Cafeman said:

If you haven't already watched this excellent documentary on the development of Saturn Virtua Racing, check it out.  I've bookmarked the time index for when one of the developers explains how difficult it was to test this game because SEGA hadn't provided a dev kit yet, or decent debugger for the twin CPU's.  So they just used 1 CPU  - which helps to explain why just about every 3rd party did likewise for a while.  

 

 

 

Love the Saturn Version

[Hwlngmad]

On 2/21/2021 at 5:10 AM, IntelliMission said:

I never touched a Saturn back in the day as none of my friends had it (the closer I was to the Saturn was one guy who said he won one in a Sega Rally contest).

 

However, as someone who considers the original Playstation my favorite console, I'm starting to appreciate the console because it's definitely the most similar one to Sony's first console.

 

They were released at the same time and had very similar graphics, and even similar games many times (with Namco and Sega doing the arcade ports).

 

Sony killed the Saturn by offering a similar "mature" and pixelated approach, but with:

 

- A cool name and a cool looking controller (Saturn's name and logo are terrible and the controller looks too similar to previous Sega controllers).

 

- Much better "non arcade" games (Panzer Dragoon games are great, but Sonic R, Burning Rangers, Nights and others feel like failed experiments).

 

- Konami, Namco, Electronic Arts, Square... I'm not sure exactly what happened, but Sega somehow did not a good job securing games from many major developers.

 

- A console that was much more easy to program (even if some Saturn games look pretty cool when the 2nd processor is used well).

 

- A clear focus on 3D games Vs. the 2D approach that seemed to prevail in the Saturn.

 

- Sega couldn't win the price war against an entertainment industry giant.

 

Looking back, I feel kind of bad for Sega. In a way, Sony won thanks to a few things that I don't really appreciate (I hate turn-based RPGs, Sony clearly used their ability to throw more money to gain exclusiveness with companies, Electronic Arts sports games sucked in the 90s or at least the soccer ones did...).

 

It's crazy when you think about the first games for the original Playstation, that were not very interesting. I wonder if Sega thought that Sony's first console was going to be another 3DO.

The major ace that Sony had up its sleeve was it saw what Nintendo and Sega were looking to do long-term wise and caught them both with their pants down.  I know that a lot people wondered how Sony would fair with their first console and they just crushed it.  Still, I have been playing around with Saturn titles lately on my Nvidia Shield TV and there is a lot to like on the system.

[Hydro Thunder]

7 hours ago, Hwlngmad said:

The major ace that Sony had up its sleeve was it saw what Nintendo and Sega were looking to do long-term wise and caught them both with their pants down.  I know that a lot people wondered how Sony would fair with their first console and they just crushed it.  Still, I have been playing around with Saturn titles lately on my Nvidia Shield TV and there is a lot to like on the system.

Boy could this be a topic we could stretch out for years

I'd say it was a combination of big issues.  Firstly as IntelliMission pointed out, Sony had basically an unlimited budget (if they chose to use it) for this.  I would add their motivation after Nintendo Completely and Unprofessionally insulted them with the Snes CD situation (by going with Phillips after basically letting Sony do all the work etc) also was a factor.

But yeah, I would say they caught both Nintendo and Sega floundering after the big 16-bit war.  They made a system that was easy to program for, handled 3d very well with special effects, gave out dev kits (WITH debugging!) left and right to developers, threw money at who they needed to...  And in terms of games, they had a lot of all spectrums.  Basically they had the Sports games that those types of gamers wanted, and on the opposite shore they had Square and others for RPGs, plus Crash and Spyro for action / kids / whatever.  Sega basically had Arcade games, with arcades slowly dying.  Nintendo had...well.  Personal opinion here but I never understood how they survived the N64 perfectly honestly (possibly the success of the GB / GBC / GBA or whatever helping to backdrop their other sales?). I didn't think Nintendo had much but their same old tried and true, Mario, Starfox, Kirby, Mario Kart.  And Rare.

 

Oh, and those Saturn ads?  WTH?  I mean, the Genesis ads were edgy, clever, pointed.

Saturn ads?  I didn't even know what they were about half the time, or they seemed whiny when they were trying to be combative.  

Sony definitely burned them with the brochure that had a bunch of PS games shown, and at the end, said "If after seeing all that you still want a Saturn...Your head's in Uranus".    And Sophia or Polygon Man or Crash Bandicoot were much better.  Sega should've gone with their Japanese campaign with that Saturn guy beating you up if you didn't play Saturn, even on Xmas.

[Hwlngmad]

16 hours ago, Curious Sofa said:

Boy could this be a topic we could stretch out for years

I'd say it was a combination of big issues.  Firstly as IntelliMission pointed out, Sony had basically an unlimited budget (if they chose to use it) for this.  I would add their motivation after Nintendo Completely and Unprofessionally insulted them with the Snes CD situation (by going with Phillips after basically letting Sony do all the work etc) also was a factor.

But yeah, I would say they caught both Nintendo and Sega floundering after the big 16-bit war.  They made a system that was easy to program for, handled 3d very well with special effects, gave out dev kits (WITH debugging!) left and right to developers, threw money at who they needed to...  And in terms of games, they had a lot of all spectrums.  Basically they had the Sports games that those types of gamers wanted, and on the opposite shore they had Square and others for RPGs, plus Crash and Spyro for action / kids / whatever.  Sega basically had Arcade games, with arcades slowly dying.  Nintendo had...well.  Personal opinion here but I never understood how they survived the N64 perfectly honestly (possibly the success of the GB / GBC / GBA or whatever helping to backdrop their other sales?). I didn't think Nintendo had much but their same old tried and true, Mario, Starfox, Kirby, Mario Kart.  And Rare.

 

Oh, and those Saturn ads?  WTH?  I mean, the Genesis ads were edgy, clever, pointed.

Saturn ads?  I didn't even know what they were about half the time, or they seemed whiny when they were trying to be combative.  

Sony definitely burned them with the brochure that had a bunch of PS games shown, and at the end, said "If after seeing all that you still want a Saturn...Your head's in Uranus".    And Sophia or Polygon Man or Crash Bandicoot were much better.  Sega should've gone with their Japanese campaign with that Saturn guy beating you up if you didn't play Saturn, even on Xmas.

All really good points.  Definitely Sega's own worst enemy was itself in the 32-bit era.  Also, regarding Nintendo, they were able to milk the SNES for all it was worth, which wound up outselling the Mega Drive / Genesis worldwide.  Also, the big N dominated the handheld market and gave them just bookoos of money.  Additionally, the N64, while it sold for sh*t in Japan, sold really well in the U.S. and decently in Europe.

[Zap1982]

And the other thing Nintendo did..

 

POKEMON..... don't forget Pokemon. The world went crazy for it. People were buying Gameboys just for Pokemon. Snap and Stadium were also reasons to grab the N64. The first glimpse of "realistic" 3D Pokemon.

[Hydro Thunder]

4 hours ago, Zap1982 said:

And the other thing Nintendo did..

 

POKEMON..... don't forget Pokemon. The world went crazy for it. People were buying Gameboys just for Pokemon. Snap and Stadium were also reasons to grab the N64. The first glimpse of "realistic" 3D Pokemon.

True dat.  Personally I liked Monster Rancher for the PS better, but that's a whole different thing.  Pokemon is its own worldwide phenom.

[Zap1982]

 

The earliest form of DLC?

 

As the camera pans the queue, I'm the ginger guy in the black leather that waves at the camera. Of course like Pokemon, my "evolved form" 20+ years later looks very different ?

[Hydro Thunder]

Plug and play Satiator, looks awesome, but sold out currently:

$260, but sold out.

https://www.satiator.net/Satiator_p_12.html

 

My CD drive is starting to squeak a bit (ack!), so nice to have an option other than the MODE (which I'd have to pay someone to install, I'm not competent with such things) if I need to go there.  

[+Cafeman]

The Satiator is expensive but looks like a great solution.  My Saturn doesn't want to spin the disc any more so I'm thinking about going all-digital solution and actually selling off my disc games.